IT’LL BE A CHAMPIONSHIP SUMMER

To those of you who demand fighters “stay in their lanes” and only worry about number one contenders; get ready to be upset. This summer; more precisely, International Fight Week it’s looking like a champion vs champion extravaganza. Before the ceremonial weigh-ins for UFC ON FOX 27; the UFC made a “major announcement”. They announced that the coaches for season 27 of TUF will be heavyweight champion STIPE MIOCIC and light heavyweight champion DANIEL CORMIER.

Season 27 is the “undefeated season”. Fighters will all be undefeated with a minimum record of 3-0. The show starts filming around the 28th of January, but debuts on April 18th. The cast is made up of 8 featherweights and 8 lightweights. This is a massive wrinkle in the casting of the show as this is the 1st time fighters from different divisions will coach then fight; let alone be champions. The July 7th fight between Stipe and DC will be for the heavyweight title. Should Cormier win he becomes only the 5th 2 division champion in the UFC. Daniel since moving to light heavyweight has always been peppered with the question; “will you ever return to heavyweight?”. His answer has always been a steadfast “ABSOLUTELY NOT”. During the press tour for UFC 220 when asked he’d say look at the size of Francis (Ngannou); I don’t want any part of that. He’s also recently made it crystal clear to everyone that he’s done fighting at age 40. So the sands in the hour glass are slipping away quickly (approximately 14 months from now). He was 13-0 before going down in class so he’d never have to fight his very close friend and teammate CAIN VELASQUEZ. But one has to wonder why the quick change in Daniel’s thinking. He’s part owner in 2 barbershops, he’s a FOX broadcaster, and has multiple other things to keep him busy. It is VERY SAFE TO ASSUME; that with the way Stipe handled Francis that put the idea into DC’s head he could do the same being he’s a much better wrestler than Miocic. All this went down very very fast; there was no drawn out negotiations here. With Jon Jones still off the table Daniel could very well be thinking that Ngannou would be the perfect “big name big talent big splash” opponent to finish his career against. Daniel asked the still recovering from multiple injuries Cain what he thought; and Velasquez gave DC his blessings to go for it. Cain’s starting to workout again and by the time he’s fully back Daniel will probably have just 1 fight left in him, with Cain taking a “tune up” fight or two assuring they never have to mix it up for real.

But that’s not all for the July 7th card at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas. It’s looking like the “hot topic dream fight” of DJ vs TJ will happen then also. As would the CYBORG vs NUNES super fight. If you think “HOLY SMOKES WOW”; that too is not all. Unification of the middleweight is likely too. Not shockingly TYRON WOODLEY wants in on “all the fun too”. Although he is insistent on not being interested in fighting COLBY COVINGTON or RDA. Again he mentioned GSP; however the Canadian is still dealing with colitis and most likely if at all won’t be back for another year. Oh and two other fighters have teased returns very close to fight week that could be pushed back a month. Their names: CONOR MCGREGOR and NATE DIAZ. Meaning if history shows us anything, when they pile up 1 card so heavy; the next couple of months suffer. Even for a very deep roster that the UFC has.